Drawing near to God through prayer and creativity

Monthly Archives: October 2014

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. 4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

Ephesians 6: 11- 13

Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. 11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age,against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

2 Timothy 1:6-7

6 Therefore I remind you to stir up the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands. 7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

This world that we live in is not our eternal home and I praise God for that! It can be dark, evil and oppressive. We are in a constant battle between the light and the dark. Each one of us needs to seek understanding, from Father God, Daddy, Papa, on where we are to stand in this battle…in the LIGHT! Ask Him what your position is and He will tell you. We all have one. No one can tell you but your Father in Heaven.

I believe that all people were made to be vessels of light, life and love, but not all are yet able to because of the battle that is raging around us-this war for control and power in the heavenly places. It is a fight between the Light and the dark. The enemy of God, satan, wants control over God’s children and some of Papa’s kids are in a death grip and don’t know how to get out of it. They are screaming for help and don’t even know it. They have been blinded by the lies of deception, defeat, oppression, rejection, and the list goes on. They cannot hear God among the chaos and confusion of the enemy, so they clap thier hands over thier ears to stifle the noise around them. Death is chasing them and they can feel it and they react out of thier need to be rescued, often hiding in the pain that swirls around them. But hiding does not fix anything- it only causes one to go deeper into self, loneliness, depression, rejection, etc.. I know. I used to live in and from this place of darkness and if I’m not on guard it can subtly creep in and then I’m in trouble again.

The only place we are to hide is IN Christ. What does the Psalmist say?

Psalm 91:4

He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge;

his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.

HIS faithfulness is our shield and rampart. When we stand IN the Light of His Love, we are standing like a shield for Christ. We are NOT the shield- He IS. We are a vessel that He moves around like a chess piece from one place to the next. We go on the King’s command and we stand where He tells us to stand, firmly planted like an oak tree, breathing His Life in and out.

The Lord has called us, YOU and I to live in and move from His Light. It’s His battle and He tells us where to stand and what to do. Sometimes we are called to speak life and be a light of love. Other times we are called to stand in the silence and just BE His lighthouse, shining His Light in the dark places. The Presence of Christ in us breaks barriers. It isn’t anything about us. It is all Jesus. We are to hear the call of the trumpet blast and then follow the instruction He gives us. We might not know any of the details until we step into the direction of YES, so just trust and go.

The only way we can do this is IN CHRIST ALONE. It is Yahweh who makes the way. We must unplug everything and listen to His Voice. We must take the stuffing of “self” out of our ears and get rid of any infection that is in us that keeps us from hearing the Truth. Sometimes it takes awhile to unravel the stuffing and clean up the mess with the antibiotic of His Love, one drop at a time, one day at a time and even a lifetime. We all have hearing “aids”-things that we think help us hear God better-books, study guides, people, sermons, videos, conferences and on and on and on. While those things can be good for study purposes they can also become a hindrance to our hearing. When we begin to hear those things over the Word of the Lord then we have a problem, an infection that needs the healing of the Great Physician.

Jesus is the Balm that heals all wounds, the Balm of Gilead. When we go to Him and we say, “help!” He is there, pouring His liquid love into our wounds, again and again and again. It takes me a long time to heal. I don’t know why, it just does. I have a lot of scars ( inside and out, physical, spiritual and emotional) from my hearing issues ( surgery, rejection, being picked on, poked and prodded at and on and on) and it wasn’t until I showed Papa the wounds behind my ears ( that He could see, but that I kept hidden) that He could pour out His oil over them and bring healing to me. I had forgotten they were there until He reminded me a few days ago. When I realized it I wept inside and then received much joy from letting it go. He was bringing even more healing to the deepest places of pain, where the actual bone has been removed. Wow. Thank you Lord!!! We all have stuff we think is hidden but it isn’t really, so stop fooling yourself and just give it to the Great Healer, Jehovah Rapha. He came to bind up the brokenhearted and release healing over the earth. Today it is His Healing that I hear in my ears, the Truth of His Word. He HAS healed my hearing ! Praise GOD!!!!!!

During a recent time of ministry, with an amazing group of kids, I watched a little boy crawl underneath a table to get away from the noise and chaos around him. He said he couln’t hear God. As I stood there and watched him crawl under the table, curl up and clasp his hands over his ears with a look of fear on his face, I saw myself. Tears came to my eyes and I had a moment with Jesus right there in that room with all those kids. This was a marker moment for me. It was the first time I had ever shared my hearing issues with a group of children like that. I had always kept my struggle hidden…

no more….no more…

Hiding our pain causes us to be fake and when people don’t there’s a problem, how can they help you? They can’t. God doesn’t want anything but authenticity, the real thing, even when it hurts. He wants us to release all the pain to Him-He carries it already, we just don’t see it that way. He’s always been there. Lord, help us. Give us eyes to see and ears to hear and know Your Voice.

I heard His Voice and Direction clearer than I ever have in my life in this time with these kids. My infection is gone! Praise GOD! What I have heard, seen and experienced is the VICTORY on the battlefield like never before. It feels like my ears and eyes are wide open and all I can see IS the VICTORY into the LIGHT!! I will stand IN HIM the rest of the days of my life here on earth. I will sing, shout, paint and create the Victory of the Lord. His arms are raised over us as He declares His Truth over us, ” I came so that you might have life!” We must choose to see the Light that shines through His Wounds and work from that place, and when we do then the world becomes a better place, here and now. When we stand IN the Light, we become like the Light and Heaven can come to earth through our vessels .

Wooooooooshhhhhhhhh…..

” Father forgive me, for I know NOT what I do. Papa, thank you for Your enduring love and faithfulness to always hearing me when I cry out to you from my hiding place. LORD GOD ALMIGHTY, I thank you for raising Your banner, Your Son, over me in this amazing love that shines on me from the Lighthouse of Eternity. Mercy and Grace hold Him there in Your Love. You are the beam of Light that never goes out. You are the glow in the night that helps me find my way, YAHWEH. You, Oh Lord, my King and my God Almighty, are like the sun that shines in the day and the moon that lights the path at night and the stars that streamed forth from your glorious mouth in a breath of Light. You rise inside of me like a beacon in the night and my soul cries out to You meet you in the covering of Your Life. Your arms stretched across the heavens like a shield of Love, forever protecting us as we walk in the Light. I love you my Lord, my God, and my King and it is to you forever that I will sing, How Great is our God! It is Your Victory that calls!

As the artist I am, I fall in love with Jesus through every piece of art that I create. Every time I sit at the easel, I fall deeper in love with Him. Each piece reveals the Light of Papa’s Love. The Lord has put His desire in me to create ONLY for Him, to pour forth His Word through the wonder of His color wheel…the wheel of Light and Life. It speaks, breathes, sings and dances HIS song of healing, redeeming and restoring UNITY over this earth. As “we” ( Jesus and I) place the colors on the brush and gently lay the paint on the canvas in a dance-His Word comes to life in a visual image for the world to see. HIS love is revealed through our union. It’s a rather unique place to live from-to spend the days creating with and for the Lord. I think about the scribes a lot when I create because every Hebrew letter is a picture of Jesus in the Word… “and then the Word became flesh…” revealing Himself to all of creation in His Image! All strokes carry great meaning and each stroke needs the next to tell the Story of His Love, just like the body of Christ. Scribing and painting go together just as cooking and cleaning or breathing and living. We all need the Lord and each other and the scriptures tell us this Truth over and over again.

In John 17 Jesus prays for His disciples- that would be us today- He is looking toward heaven as He says, “ Father…PAPA…ABBA…Daddy…I pray that they will be ONE just as you are in Me and I am in You. “ I sense that Jesus was praying His heart out ( from his guts-his deepest inner place) in John 17, pouring out to Papa, his heart’s desire for everyone else to see his Father. He is saying, “ Daddy, I did what you told me to do- I showed the world who YOU are through me and I’m almost home. We have one more thing to do and I’ll be back with You soon. I can’t wait to get back Home and sit in the light of Your Glory, IN YOUR PRESENCE, together, with You.” That light is His Wonder and He fills my heart with it.

As I sit in His Presence and create from that place things happen, the Lord speaks and we become One in the marrying of paint, brush and canvas. It’s like I can hear sharper, clearer, a fine tuning! The conversation begins and sometimes there are tears and other times there are “ WOW! Really??? That’s awesome! YOU are awesome!” Lol! There might be new ideas or people who come to mind as we create together. When people come to mind we talk about them and I ask Him to take care of their needs. Sometimes the painting is for them and other times it is a call for me to pray for them. Lately it has been a lot of praying for the leaders of the nations and the church.

The church. How I love the church. Jesus loves the church too. The beautiful, wonderful, magnificent body of Christ. Broken and bruised and in need of a Savior named Jesus. It is my heart cry that when people view what the Holy Spirit creates they will be touched and will see, hear and know Jesus. He IS the Master Artist who holds this brush, me. I must listen closely and only choose the colors He tells me to. Not always easy and at times I find myself wiping things away that don’t belong there. My hand must always be in tune with the Spirit and when things get messy I am reminded to take every thought captive and start anew again and as we do, the Lord takes my every thought, color, shape, line and image captive and makes it HIS. All of YOU Lord, none of me. Like paint pouring from His color wheel, the Lord has filled me with a life work to paint pieces of Victory and share them across the earth. The Victory is HIS-all HIS. I never imagined doing this, but Papa designed it this way and I know it. I don’t have complete understanding-but I do have a complete KNOWING that this is it. It is deep intercession for the body of Christ.

The Lord has given me the desire of His heart-to seek Peace and Unity across this earth, also one to see the face of “church” transformed into His Image and His Image alone. The things that are happening inside the church are wrong and the Lord has said we are to “clean house” and “get things in order- to put things right again.” This means for us, individually and collectively. Our sanctuaries are upside down and inside out and it’s time, NOW, to get out the LIESOL and clean up the mess with the Truth of the Lord and when we do TRUTH will be revealed!! Where there is Truth, there is Light and Life. His Name is JESUS and He is standing in the middle of our messes waiting for us to cry out to Him…” He is the drumbeat of my heart. Jesus! Jesus! Jesus! YHWH, YHWH, YHWH. Holy! Holy! Holy! He IS our worship and we have been called to worship HIM in Spirit and in Truth! Painting is worship and the color wheel teaches us about the Truth of Harmony and where there is Harmony there is VICTORY! Just study out the colors of the covenant, the priestly garments, the sacred veil and all of the furnishings in the Tabernacle, along with the foundation of heaven and you’ll see…….

…you will SEE…and HEAR…and KNOW the Truth of His amazing Love through the wonder of His color wheel!

Blessings as you discover the colors of Victory that flow from Christ-our Color Wheel. He is the center from whom all blessings of Light and Life flow. Where HE is, Life IS. Hallelujah and AMEN!